Dragonspell - Donita K. Paul [7]
The council told me not to take it out of the pouch until I reached The Hall in Vendela. Could I have broken it just by taking it out? I thought it was too hard to break. What happens if I did break it? What will the wizards of The Hall do to a village girl who broke a dragon egg?
She turned the egg over in her hand, hoping she would see some sign that this promise of a new life was not damaged. The dragon egg warmed and began its gentle thrum.
“Maybe it is just the light in here.”
She relaxed and enjoyed holding her treasure. After only a moment, her ease gave way to amazement. The weariness and aches that had overcome her body were vanishing. The hunger squeezing her middle was gone as well. Her eyes opened wide as she watched the small scrapes and scratches on her bloody toes and knees heal over. The damage to her body disappeared as if it had never been, but the torn cloth of her trousers was as ragged as ever.
When the last break in her skin closed, she stared at the egg in her hand as if she had never seen it before. If her clothes hadn’t been tattered and bloody, she would have thought she’d dreamed the injuries. As her excitement grew, the egg jumped. She tightened her grip to keep it from falling.
“I guess you aren’t broken,” she said with a grin.
She tucked the egg back in its pouch and pushed the bag inside her shirt. She moved the other eggs onto the rock and tied a knot in the scarf about a foot from one end. She tucked one egg in next to that knot, folded the soft cloth around it. Using a length of thread from the unraveling edge of her tunic, she secured the egg and tied a knot. She placed another egg on her makeshift sling and tied it in. When finished, she had a ropelike object with seven bulges. She tied the egg-bearing blue scarf around her waist, next to her skin, under the tunic and shirt.
“Now, let’s get out of here.”
She stood and trotted across the floor of the cavern, neatly dodging around the glowing columns. Just as she reached the opening of the tunnel, she had a thought. She turned to search the area around her.
Spying a fist-sized rock lying on the ground, she rushed to pick it up. Dozens of crystals shimmered from the rough stone. She smiled and carried it into the dark tunnel.
The way back didn’t seem nearly as long. The enchantment, which had pulled her in, had disappeared when she touched the first egg. No dread of what was ahead plagued her thoughts. The rock glowed in the tunnel. She could see several feet ahead of her, although it was awkward to hold the rock and crawl.
She pushed on, eager to get to the cave and climb out the top. The thought of the grawligs awakening helped her to hurry. She halted as soon as her head poked through the opening from the tunnel to the dimly lit cave.
Three beams of light still fell in straight shafts from the outside. They’d shifted with the movement of the sun.
Her ears told her something else had changed. She tilted her head, trying to identify the clamor. The grawligs no longer snored. Instead she heard metal clanging against metal, angry shouts, frenzied commands, and roars of fury. If she was not mistaken, sounds of battle echoed from all three openings of the cave.
4
FRIEND OR FOE?
This time Kale raised her head out of the hole even more cautiously. Judging from the tumult, she had expected an army to be facing the grawligs. Kale spotted only three attackers—two mounted on dragons. Most of the noise came from the mountain ogres.
The third attacker stood within a circle of the grawligs and felled them right and left, wielding a sling-type weapon with a spiked ball at the end. She recognized him as a fighting marione like the race of people populating River Away. His muscled frame, short and blocklike, stood solid against the onslaught. Known as farmers and fighters, the mariones could make any ground productive and defend any ground against invaders.
The dragons in the air were not as big as the Greater Dragons Kale